She panicked momentarily before her wolf picked up the familiar, spicy and smoky scent that only belonged to Pax Carrigan. He was moving her away from the danger.
In the shuffle, she lost sight of her brother and Tanner. Were they okay?
“Pax,” she protested as he spun her around and started pushing her with his body toward a far hallway that led to the elevators and the fitness room.
“Keep moving,” he said, his voice incredibly close to her ear, causing ill-timed and unwanted shivers to snake across her neck and down her spine.
“Did you see who it was? Was anybody hurt?” She asked the questions as he continued to herd her, his large body on hers, down the hall. When they’d rounded the corner, he motioned for her to stand beside him while he peeked back around the corner at the chaos unfolding.
She took the scant few seconds to study him.
Despite the fact that he’d walked away from her a decade ago, Ava had disobeyed every rational thought and tried to follow Pax Carrigan’s movements. His whereabouts were basically unknown for the six years he’d been in the Army, but once he’d resurfaced in Colorado, she’d been given confirmation that he was okay.
She’d promised herself that was all she needed, but it didn’t stop her from trying to learn more about who he’d become and the pack he’d helped start with the war hero Gray Anders.
Ava studied the chiseled outline of Pax’s jaw as it worked in a tight line while he took in the scene beyond the wall. He’d managed to produce a small handgun from somewhere on his body and Ava wasn’t exactly surprised. He’d always been so serious about his duties—even when he was a teenager forced to grow up too soon and care for his younger brothers when their mother disappeared for days on end.
The attack sounds grew louder, the screaming and gunshots closer. He shot a glance to her.
“Don’t move, Ava,” he said and she frowned. “If you see anything, hear anything come closer to you, run for that rear exit and don’t look back. Do you understand?”
His dark eyes searched hers for a moment longer than necessary and she swallowed the lump in her throat. The moment was so heavy with unspoken words, and so inappropriate at a time like this. She wanted to ask him every question she’d been forced to hold in her heart all these years. She bit her own lip to break the spell.
Nodding dumbly, she couldn’t form the words to speak. Knowing what he was about to do, Ava’s mind raced for a way to stop him. She hated him, yes, but she didn’t want him to do what she knew he was about to.
Stay, Pax, she wanted to say. But she didn’t. And before she knew it, he was gone—headed straight for danger. He’d never listened to her, anyway. Pax had always held duty and missions well above her their entire lives together.
***
The scene was contained within a half hour. Three shifters in attendance had been shot, but thanks to their healing abilities, were healing. According to Mason, they were high-powered weapons that were likely military grade, so the injured shifters had a long road of recovery ahead of them.
Two of the three attackers had gotten away, but Gray and Pax had managed to tackle the third shooter and had broken both the guy’s arms within minutes. Of course they had, she sniffed.
Pax was nothing if not consistent.
Always the protector. Always the noble idiot.
When the authorities arrived and secured the scene, the crowd dispersed and she found herself face to face with her brother.
“That was him, wasn’t it?”
Mason knew that Pax had broken the hell out of her wee little high school heart. She’d tried to downplay it over the years, but as her older brother, he always knew. Ava was surprised that he’d been so civil to Pax, actually, when they were introduced.
But he was an Alpha and had an important job to do at these meetings—bring people together, not drive them apart. And his little sister’s high school drama wasn’t worth more than the safety of vulnerable small packs and the wellbeing of shifter society in general.
Ava let out a long, drawn out breath and ran her hands through her hair, unable to think of anything else but how Pax had come straight for her when the danger started. And she’d allowed him to take charge of the situation, and she’d allowed him to move her to safety. It was like no matter how much time or distance had occurred between them, her body and her mind just ached to fall in line with that infuriating man.
“Are you hurt, Ava?”
Tanner arrived before she could answer Mason’s question.
“I’m fine,” she said, suddenly realizing she hadn’t seen the Beta since the shooting began. Had he been hurt? “Are you okay? I lost sight of you in the crowd.”
Tanner was giving her a once over, most likely assuring himself of her safety, just like Mason had. His light brown hair was mussed and his hazel eyes were worried. He was a handsome enough man, but he’d never filled the hole in her heart Pax had left. Poor Tanner had never even come close.
For all intents and purposes, Ava considered Tanner an ex-boyfriend. They’d had a fling that lasted a few months when he’d first arrived at the Pueblo pack four years ago. It’d been fun, but brief. He was a massive flirt, and Ava, despite enjoying the attention he gave her when he was around her, had always been in search of something deeper.
Something like what she had with Pax all those years ago, she bitterly admitted to herself many times. Damn that man—he’d practically ruined her chances of having mindless fun, even now.
“And yes, Mason,” she said, turning to her brother. “That was him.”
Tanner didn’t miss the exchange and raised an eyebrow at Mason.
“Ava’s high school sweet heart,” Mason explained. “Broke her heart to join the military.”
Tanner frowned, slowly catching up.
“Oh,” he said slowly, the realization dawning on him. “The Canyon Beta? He’s an ex?”
Mason snorted.
“He’s the ex,” her brother laughed. “The only one that ever rated in her life. The one that she’s never gotten over.”
Shit. Ava’s eyes jumped to Tanner just in time to catch the dark look that flashed across his features. Oops. Mason had been pretty clueless as to her love life, especially in those first few years that he was Alpha. She’d never outright told him that she and Tanner had messed around with dating for a few months, she’d just always assumed he knew.
Apparently, he hadn’t. And apparently, Tanner didn’t like not rating in Ava’s romantic history.
“Did we get any answers yet?” She asked, doing everything she could to change the subject. “Who is responsible for the attack?”
Mason sighed heavily.
“The police aren’t saying anything yet, but we all know who’s behind it,” he said, his eyes scanning the crowd. Ava found herself doing the same and looking for one shifter in particular—Pax. Had he survived his heroic escapade unscathed?
As much as she disliked him, she hoped he wasn’t hurt.
The crowds were thinning as people were allowed to leave after being interviewed by police. Had Pax or his packmates been injured? The need to know was gnawing at both Ava and her wolf, who was persistently pushing at her to find Pax.
As she moved away toward the crowd, she felt a large hand grab her bicep. Instinctively, she knew it was Tanner. Glancing back, she gave him a questioning look.
“No way,” he said. “You’re not going into that mess.”
Ava’s eyes rested on Tanner’s seconds before pulling her arm from his grasp.
“You’re my Beta,” she said. “Not my Alpha. Not my father.”
Without waiting for Mason to order her to stay put, she continued to march into the crowd and look for the Canyon wolves. The scene was heartbreaking, even if it’d been mostly cleaned up by now and the injured moved. Shifters—men and women—walked around with faraway looks in their eyes, unable to comprehend what had just happened. And blood splattered on the walls where victims had been hit. Ava shuddered despit
e herself.
The worst part, the part that was gnawing at her insides was that she didn’t have to wonder who’d done this or even why they’d done it. It was the ferals, and they’d done it to send a message to the packs who had gathered.
They were just getting started, the message seemed to say.
Running a hand through her hair as she walked, Ava had a momentary lapse of calm and wondered how much of a role she played in this attack. If she and Mason hadn’t made it a mission to get the packs to band together, would the ferals have felt the need to make a statement like that? A statement that assured everyone gathered that no matter how many of them banded together, they’d never be truly safe?
Against a side wall, Ava pushed forward, searching every face.
Why had Pax protected her and not his Alpha male or female? She hadn’t failed to notice that before Mason or even Tanner could react, Pax had shielded her with his body and moved her toward safety.
Why?
All those years ago, he’d made clear how he truly felt and if there’d been a sliver of doubt in her mind, the fact that he hadn’t tried to contact her a single time in the decade that followed made it even more painfully obvious. He didn’t care for her.
And yet, in one single moment—a moment that would likely be etched in her memory forever, he’d come to her and protected her against imminent danger.
It was nearly impossible to process. Ava shook her head to clear her thoughts and she tried to ignore the sinking feeling in her chest when she didn’t see Pax, or any of the Canyon wolves for that matter, in the crowd any longer.
Sighing, she turned and headed toward the elevators.
Chapter Three
Pax
They’d taken the coyote shifter offsite as fast as they’d subdued him and the beaten, bloody man now found himself tied to a chair in the hollowed out building that used to be a tire warehouse. It was a friend of a friend of Gray’s type of situation and the man had been more than willing to help out the shifters who needed a place to interrogate a terrorist.
Gray had put a call into Mason Montclair, who’d organized the event in the first place and the Pueblo Alpha was on his way over to help with the interrogation.
From the wheezing sound in the coyote’s chest and the blood that pooled on the floor around him, he’d be lucky to make it to sunrise.
Pax let out a long breath as he leaned against the wall in the shadows, keeping an eye on the prisoner and doing everything he could not to think about the what ifs.
What if Ava had been shot? Or killed? What if he hadn’t been there to protect her?
His wolf raged at the thought of her being one of the bloody messes on the ground he’d had to jump over to reach the gunman they’d caught.
Protecting her, putting his body around hers to shield her from violence, had been as natural as breathing and he hadn’t thought twice about it, even after all these years. With nothing to do but watch a soon-to-be dead gunman, Pax had plenty of time to think, something he hated doing when it came to the past.
She’d appeared like an angel out of the crowd. Had Gray known she would be there and not told him? It didn’t make sense. Gray only knew about Pax growing up in Northern California—he hadn’t known Ava’s name, let alone that she and her brother had switched packs and now lived less than two hours away from them.
How long had she lived in Colorado, so close to him? His stomach knotted at the thought. Years? Had she spent years just down the road from him and he’d spent every second wide awake in his bed, unable to sleep, thinking about her face and wondering where she was now?
Pax shook his head to clear his thoughts. This line of thought would get him nowhere but distracted and he had a job to do. As soon as the Pueblo shifters arrived, he and Gray would get some answers out of the trigger-happy asshole currently trying to work his hands out of the expert knot Pax had put him in.
He let out a mirthless laugh.
“Keep trying,” he growled. “You’ll just shred your wrists even worse.”
The coyote heard him and snapped his head in Pax’s direction. For a man about to die, he sure had a lot of anger surging through him.
“You know the best part?” The coyote gargled when he tried to laugh. “This doesn’t mean a damn thing. There are so many of us mobilizing. Redemption is coming and there’s nothing you cowards can do to stop us.”
He gave a wracking laugh, causing bits of red spray to fly everywhere. But Pax wasn’t impressed. He’d dealt with delusional extremists before and it was all the same—nothing could make them see reason and nothing could slate their thirst for imagined revenge.
“How cute,” Pax drolled. “You named your club. Now we have a name to use when we hunt you little chicken shits down.”
The arrival of Gray, Mason, and his Beta cut their little conversation short. The Beta, Tanner was his name, Pax believed, set his wolf on edge and made Pax keep a wary eye on him. He hadn’t missed the way he touched Ava so freely and almost possessively. He’d wanted to know the story between them right away, despite not having the right to question who she had been with over the past decade.
Still, his wolf raised its hackles at the other Beta’s approach and, from the flinty look the other man shot Pax, the feeling was mutual.
Mason walked straight to the restrained coyote shifter and stood in front of him, his hands on his hips and his eyes narrowed.
“What were you hoping to accomplish today?”
The question hung in the air a moment before the coyote lifted his head to look at the Alpha.
“Blood,” he said ominously. “On your hands and the hands of your bitch sister.”
The snarl that escaped from Pax was instant and ferocious. It was one thing to act like a bastard in front of them, but to let mention of Ava pass from his lips was almost more than he could handle.
“Because we’re not afraid of you? Because we don’t want other packs to fear you?”
Mason’s eyes flashed brilliant blue, a tell-tale sign his wolf was close to the surface and pushing for release. Oh, the Pueblo Alpha was pissed all right.
“You’re all going to die for even trying,” was all the shifter said before the other Beta, Tanner, advanced on the coyote and put an end to all the talking with a slash of his extended claws, effectively ending their interrogation.
If Gray was pissed, he didn’t say anything. He just assessed the man with a steady gaze and looked to Mason, who seemed just as surprised as they all felt.
“Would have liked to get a few more questions in before you did that,” Gray finally said with his easy drawl, but Pax didn’t miss the hard line in his eyes. Yes, his Alpha was well and truly pissed that Tanner had acted so rashly when there was vital information to be gleaned from the coyote. Pax, too, was concerned that they’d gone through the trouble to capture the violent shifter alive and in a fit of rage, the Beta had undone anything useful they might have gotten from him.
“That was a bit rash,” Pax muttered before grabbing his phone from his back pocket and shooting a text to the local “clean up” crew. Moving toward the vehicles, Mason got in stride beside Gray.
“I’d like to discuss a few things with you,” he said as they moved towards the parking lot. “Would you mind stopping by my hotel suite tonight?”
Pax was curious, and obviously, Gray was curious, too, because he agreed to the time and place. In the past, Gray had been content to leave the Canyon pack out of most conflicts, but more and more, the guardian nature of an Alpha was changing him. He was more protective of others, even those not necessarily in his pack. It was an interesting transformation to watch, and Pax wondered if having a mate had truly changed his once reclusive Alpha.
Did it happen to all shifters when they found their mates?
Not that Pax would ever know, he thought, pushing the line of thinking far from his mind. They had a meeting to attend, and Pax had work to do.
***
Later that night, after a qui
ck sleep, a shower, and a change of clothes, Pax found himself riding in an elevator with Gray and Liesel, headed toward the suite of Mason Montclair.
“Any clue what he’s going to ask?” Liesel asked her mate.
“Not a one,” Gray shrugged. It was true, they really didn’t know what the Pueblo Alpha was calling a meeting for.
Pax knocked on the designated door and moments later it swung open, held by none other than Tanner. Forcing himself to be polite, he gave a curt nod to the Beta and stepped past him, leading the way for Gray and Liesel. A few steps into the suite and Pax was instantly on edge.
Ava was here.
It shouldn’t be a surprise, Mason was her brother and Alpha and Pax knew that Ava was heavily invested in getting the packs united against the ferals, but his wolf still wasn’t used to having her so nearby and it struck him like a physical blow to the gut.
Composing himself, he inhaled quickly and took in the large living area of the suite.
Mason and Ava sat on opposite ends of the sofa. Mason looked tired and resigned and Ava looked poised for battle—clearly there had been a discussion happening prior to their arrival.
Mason stood and shook everyone’s hands, thanking them for coming.
“We got a little more information since we last spoke,” he said, diving right in as the Canyon shifters took their seats. “On top of what the coyote said about the Redemption flagship, we know the feral numbers are greater than we’d estimated.”
He glanced over at Ava, who simply nodded.
“Our initial guess was that there were between 20 and 30 lone shifters working together, loosely allied with the plan to cause a little trouble in the more remote reaches of the area. Maybe set up a gambling racket or a small drug operation if they were able to intimidate the local alpha of whatever small pack held that territory,” he said, running his hand through his hair. “But we were off. We just got reports that we’re dealing with upwards of 150 shifters banding together and calling themselves ‘Redemption.’”
Pax sucked in a breath at the number—it was staggering in terms of lone shifters. They were often wild and undisciplined, prone to violence in many cases. And that many coming together just for the sake of intimidation and criminal activity? The problem just got a whole lot worse.
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